The Fourth Kind (2009)

A thriller involving an ongoing unsolved mystery in Alaska, where one town has seen an extraordinary number of unexplained disappearances during the past 40 years and there are accusations of a federal cover up.

Director:

Olatunde Osunsanmi

Writers:

Olatunde Osunsanmi (screenplay), Olatunde Osunsanmi (story),

Stars:

Milla Jovovich, Will Patton, Hakeem Kae-Kazim

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Milla Jovovich	...	Abbey Tyler / Herself
Will Patton	...	Sheriff August
Hakeem Kae-Kazim	...	Awolowa Odusami
Corey Johnson	...	Tommy Fisher
Enzo Cilenti	...	Scott Stracinsky
Elias Koteas	...	Abel Campos
Eric Loren	...	Deputy Ryan
Mia McKenna-Bruce	...	Ashley Tyler
Raphaël Coleman	...	Ronnie Tyler
Daphne Alexander	...	Theresa
Alisha Seaton	...	Cindy Stracinski
Tyne Rafaeli	...	Sarah Fisher
Paul Stefanov	...	Timothy Fisher (as Pavel Stefanov)
Kiera McMaster	...	Joe Fisher
Sara Houghton	...	Jessica

Storyline

In 1972, a scale of measurement was established for alien encounters. When a UFO is sighted, it is called an encounter of the first kind. When evidence is collected, it is known as an encounter of the second kind. When contact is made with extraterrestrials, it is the third kind. The next level, abduction, is the fourth kind. Modern-day, Alaska, where-mysteriously since the 1960s-a disproportionate number of the population has been reported missing every year. Despite multiple FBI investigations of the region, the truth has never been discovered. Here in this remote region, psychologist Dr. Abigail Tyler began videotaping sessions with traumatized patients and unwittingly discovered some of the most disturbing evidence of alien abduction ever documented. The Fourth Kind exposes the terrified revelations of multiple witnesses. Their accounts of being visited by alien figures all share disturbingly identical details, the validity of which is investigated throughout the film.

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Plot Keywords:

alaska | alien | owl | abduction | patient | 

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Taglines:

There are four kinds of alien encounters. The fourth kind is abduction.

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Genres:

Mystery | Sci-Fi | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for violent/disturbing images, some terror, thematic elements and brief sexuality

Details

Official Sites:

Official site Official site [fr]

Country:

USA UK

Language:

English Aboriginal

Release Date:

6 November 2009 (USA)

Also Known As:

Contactos de cuarto tipo

Filming Locations:

Bulgaria

Box Office

Budget:

$10,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

£851,476 (UK) (6 November 2009)

Gross:

$25,464,480 (USA) (1 January 2010)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Universal Pictures, Gold Circle Films, Chambara Pictures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

98 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital SDDS DTS

Color:

Color Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

The movie's hoaxed interviews have angered the families of real missing persons in and around Nome, Alaska, for trivializing their loss. Melanie Edwards, Vice President of Kawerak Inc. (an organization representing tribal peoples in Alaska), described the movie as "insensitive to family members of people who have gone missing in Nome over the years". Universal has refused to discuss the movie with that organization or with local journalists.

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Goofs

When Abbey Tyer describes being abducted she says that she found finger nail marks on the floor which are clearly shown. However when she is hypnotized during the re-enactment she flies off the bed without touching the floor.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Abbey Tyler: I'm actress Milla Jovovich, and I will be portraying Dr. Abigail Tyler in The Fourth Kind. This film is a dramatization of events that occurred October 1st through the 9th of 2000, in the Northern Alaskan town of Nome. To better explain the events of this story, the director has included actual archived footage throughout the film. This footage was acquired from Nome psychologist Dr. Abigail Tyler, who has personally documented over 65 hours of video and audio materials during the ...

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Crazy Credits

Over the closing credits; there are a series of radio interviews with eyewitness to close encounters of the first to fourth kind

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Connections

Referenced in The Cinema Snob Movie (2012)

User Reviews

Poor

Alright. First of all, there is no point debating whether the film is a hoax or not. Firstly, the people in the supposedly "real" footage are actors... who have been in films. You can find it out on IMDb. The "real" Charlotte Milchard is an actress from the UK:

Plus, the people in Nome Alaska were angry that the film attributed the missing persons (who probably died from the rugged, harsh, cold terrain if anything) to UFOs and aliens. And the Alaska Press club successfully hired an attorney to make Universal pay a settlement of $20,000 for the fake news stories. Simply go to Google to confirm this.

If this story were real, it wouldn't have been released in a film, it would have been all over the news and possibly be a bigger story than Roswell... or even 9/11. It would be all over the place. But I hadn't heard a thing about it, other than an interview on Coast to Coast AM where a UFO investigator was shooting down the film for claiming it was "real" and making the actual people in UFOlogy look bad, and giving lesser credibility to real, actual stories. Shame on the producers of this movie.

As for the footage you think you saw, you probably mistook it for something else. Go get the DVD and watch the "original" scenes. Apparently, you can hear someone yell "action" in the supposedly real footage just before the man shoots his entire family.

Personally, I think the movie was a bit of a failure, unless the person viewing it actually believe it to be real. It felt a little bit like they had no budget, so they only had enough money to hire a couple of good actors, throw them into a poorly scripted movie (with an unconvincing actor as the police detective...) Some overhead shots of a city in Alaska, and wham, you have a film...

The only positive thing I can say about this film is one major highlight: indie film-making getting big... the film-makers got away with making some good cash with little budget, interesting but poorly executed marketing plan, they could afford decent actors (like Milla Jovovich and the guy who played the male psychiatrist)... I did like how you never get to see the aliens. But what's up with the scene aboard the alien spacecraft with the drills about to drill into Milla if they're not gonna show anything? Scriptwise, story-wise, it was unoriginal and uninteresting. The main problem was the slow pace of the film, lack of anything interesting that I haven't seen before in an X-files episode... And why do the aliens use Sumerian? Can't they take English lessons if they're smart enough to fly across the universe? And the biggest flaw of all? The poorly executed "realism" of the film which I could instantly tell was not "real"... all the scenes purportedly shot in 2000 had fake digital interference which can easily be done in computer video-editing programs like Vegas.

Overall, not impressed. 3/10